He straightened, took a breath, and released the podium. He stood in silence for a second and swept a hand back over his hair, which had fallen across his forehead like a black, misfired arrow.
“My family was slaughtered by pirates. I was twelve years old and I witnessed their murders. I was taken aboard a pirate ship. You have all read accounts from people, both victims and victimizers, of what occurs aboard those ships. I have no intention of going into detail about what was, for me and many others like me, a devastating experience. I trust you all to respect my wishes in this, for the sake of my family.”
Ryan saw the flashes of light popping on his father’s face and thought this respect would be highly unlikely past a shift or two, but at least there would be that shift of a pretense of privacy.
“Admiral Ashrafi brought me out of that experience and gave me the opportunity to build new and good experiences. I have a wife and a son, whom I love a great deal. I have a crew with whom I share a mutual respect. I’m a father as well as a captain. As a father I want to protect my son, and as a captain I know exactly why he needs that protection. And for these two simple reasons, I look to end this war.”
He placed his hands back on the podium and stared out at the meedees, not at the cams. The next arrow, the verbal one that counted, fell with perfect precision in timing and tone. He said it almost casually and directly to the galaxy.
“Thank you for your patience and respect. Now I will take any questions you may have.”
Ryan was aware of their eyes, the closeness of the quarters, and Sid’s arm against his arm—not quite comfort, because why did he need to be comforted?—but it was an unspoken thing, support maybe, because he’d watched his father stand in front of billions of people and admit… maybe not everything, but enough. It was enough.
And he knew from the inside out what face his father would have once he was alone with himself, out of uniform, out of sight, and it was tiring just to think about. Holding that face. Holding it in. Wanting to shout that nobody had a right.
Nobody had a right to make you afraid.
He’d lost the right not to be afraid when people shot at him. When a building came down. When his world’s color changed to red. Suddenly all you felt was afraid, with sporadic moments of forgetfulness.
And that tired you too, until you didn’t want to do anything but lay flat and forget it all completely. Forget that you were supposed to be afraid, that you were afraid, and that there had even been a time when you were oblivious.
His father wasn’t his father anymore. Not just.
He was a twelve-year-old boy watching his family murdered.
That was the private face.
That was the thing you could never talk about, because then it would want to surface in more than just words.
Ryan slid off the bunk and left Evan’s quarters, alone. His father was still talking to the meedees, addressing their bombardment of questions. About the negotiations and the striviirc-na and the war. And he knew what it was like to speak and not hear yourself, to make sense and not feel it because all your emotions were somewhere else, away from the lights and the constant questions. The expectations and the judgments.
To live in that world you had to detach yourself from it.
But sometimes that bled through to the rest of your life and you wanted to completely detach yourself. You kept people at arm’s length, or brought them in only on your terms; you went to parties and sailed and tried to forget it all. You went on a ship whose schedules you controlled, whose comms kept you safe from too many messy in-person entanglements.
You played by other people’s rules, whoever they were— meedees, dead enemies—the people who made you feel alone and fooled you into thinking it was necessary. Or worse, that you preferred it. That you even liked to be that detached.
But he never liked it. And he knew, now, neither did his father.
So he waited at the airlock for his father to come home, so that he would be the first thing his father saw when he walked up that ramp.
DIVE
A month later, April 15, 2197 EHSD, I read on the Send that EarthHub had a new president: Centralist First Minister Judy Damiani.
EarthHub President Judy Damiani.
And she was so damn pleased with herself. Her smiling face and single hand waving to the masses in her inauguration transcast was accompanied by the proud statement that her winning the votes proved that “the loyalty and solidarity of Hub citizens will always prevail over the wanton actions of deep-space Annexationists.”
“Damn election musta bin fixed,” Erret Dorr said, at one of our habitual mess-hall meals. “I sure as hell didn’t vote for her skinny Centralist arse.”
My father had pretty much ignored her after his now famous transcast, especially when she’d gotten up on that podium after him and made public, before he was ready, the items of discussion in the peace talks—which included a reparations resolution for alien colonies taken and plundered by the Hub. Naturally that didn’t go over well, especially blurted out with no bracketing explanation.
She’d known by then that my father would not allow her to contribute her view on the matter to the striviirc-na or Captain S’tlian, despite pressure from the Hub Council or Hub Command, the latter of which Admiral Grandpa officially represented in the talks. Minister Stellan Taylor of Alien Affairs, who was supposed to be the diplomatic mouthpiece for President James, sided with my father in theory, but with his boss at the end of his political term, Taylor knew which side of the galactic government currently bore the most weight, and it wasn’t the Annexationists.
So now—Centralist President Damiani.
Captain S’tlian and his Caste Master had returned to Aaian-na a week after my father’s transcast—not entirely pleased with Damiani’s lust for the limelight and her untamed mouth, which she had counted on. They supported my father and liked dealing with him and Grandpa, through Jos, but the “loose-armed Hubcentral reps” (as Nikolas put it) were another matter. Jos said the Caste Master had his work cut out for him on Aaian-na too. Opponents raised arms on both sides, apparently.
Minister Taylor and his staff stayed at Chaos Station for “any eventualities.” The next spate of meetings were scheduled for June 1. Damiani and my grandfather (and their army of govie suit support) leaped back to Earth three days after Turundrlar pulled out of dock, to “consult” with the Council (and campaign to the masses, at least in Damiani’s case). Grandpa said the break would give him a chance to do some damage control back on Earth, with the other govies.
Operation: Assassinate Pompeo, Erret called it.
That wasn’t what Grandpa meant. But he had to present the current terms to President James and try to iron out “the Azarcon upset,” as the PolitiSend coined it.
People always wanted a catch phrase.
My father’s statement had stunned the Hub—for about eight hours. Just enough time to grab some sleep, wake up, and see that nobody’s opinions had really changed on the galactic level. Sure, now more than ever most of the stations and merchant ships in the Rim and beyond supported the peace talks, but the captain’s reticence about divulging details about his past still rankled Hubcentral and those within their immediate reach. Which meant a lot of people on the Earthward side of the Spokes still thought deep spacers were odd and suspicious, and worst of all too independent, and apparently these paranoid Hubcentralists counted more than everyone from the Rim to the Dragons.
Grandpa’s damage control didn’t ultimately help.
Damiani thwarted any attempts to put a decent face on the talks by reminding everyone in all her transcasts that symps and strits were notoriously wily and couldn’t be trusted, and preemptive action was much more favorable than trusting to a long, drawn-out peace process that was spurious from the instigators up (meaning my father). My father had known her expedition to Chaos was part of her overall campaign strategy. I even suspected the timing of Pompeo’s statement, but there was no proof that he was directly a
ligned with the new administration.
Proven victorious, Damiani gobbed on about how one of her missions as the new president was to “reassess our deep space priorities”—which my father interpreted to mean that she planned to use deep spacers and their affairs as a scapegoat to the troubles in the Hub as a whole, including pirate activity and the war. Never mind it was a deep spacer spearheading the peace. That too was suspicious because deep spacers (and captains) didn’t have a right to spearhead anything on behalf of “loyal Hub citizens and their elected representatives.”
Pax Terra’s Governor Allison, who held sway over a good deal of merchant votes in Hubcentral by being their homeport, had more moderate views about the cease-fire, but cautioned all citizens to still be aware of those “in our midst who might seek to capitalize on the quiet. Vigilance will be our reward.” Sympathizers and sneak attacks, he meant. As if Pax Terra, so close to Earth, had ever been even sniffed by striviirc-na.
Musey called Damiani a bigot. Erret Dorr volunteered to go on a clandestine mission and assassinate her at the same time he brought down Pompeo, in a kind of two-for-one deal (the captain said No, even though he was tempted). Sid said she was dangerous, and my mother considered her realistic.
“I think your father needs to be more cautious,” she said to me over comm, as if I could do anything to truly influence him. We still had breakfasts and dinners together, unless he got up too early, worked too late, or I was invited to socialize with the crew. Dorr and Lieutenant Hartman made an effort to baby-sit me on occasion, though I think it was just their excuse to taunt Sid (or flirt with him, I could never figure out which). Sid got harassed in the gym sometimes, but he never let it get past jetdeck because that would’ve made it worse. He handled himself, anyway; some jets walked around bruised after their “workouts” and kept the name-calling to a minimum.
My mother would’ve given the captain a lecture if she knew what his crew was like around me. Sanchez’s unit never outwardly touched us but they made their disdain known through dirty looks and following us around dark corners. I didn’t walk the corridors alone below maindeck on Sanchez’s shift and neither did Musey and Evan, which was on Dorr’s orders because there wasn’t much point in instigating things. Not that any of the crew would really hurt me, but I didn’t trust it on certain off-shifts when they were allowed to drink. I offered to talk to the captain about it but Dorr said to leave jetdeck to jetdeck, unless it got bloody, and in that case it wouldn’t matter because Sanchez would be dead.
Besides, my father didn’t need one more thing to worry about. It was better if we policed ourselves.
Macedon, now newly refurbished, went back out on patrol of the Demilitarized Zone, but more for pirate activity (especially any that might point to that Yuri person) and wayward sympathizers who weren’t loyal to the Warboy. Naturally the Send reported any ambiguous actions by Hub captains in the deep—actions that had nothing to do with the cease-fire, but impacted public opinion of it. They zeroed in on activity that lent itself to interpretation (the treatment of prisoners aboard ship, long absences from port, comms made to “questionable” people). The spotlight may have hit my father in the face, but the diffused glow cast wide on all of his comrades.
I went to school when I wasn’t being beat up by Musey, or now Sid, in “training,” badgered (or protected, depending on your opinion) by Dorr, or hit on by jets that didn’t much like my company but thought posing a sexual threat would rattle me without too much condemnation (they knew I wouldn’t run to Daddy). It didn’t rattle me; one thing good about Tyler’s parties, I got used to roving eyes and octopus hands. Sid thought it was all funny (to a point, and then he got into fights on my behalf), and made an issue of saying how proud he was of the fact I was studying something other than my fingernails.
Partially to cast off the scent of my burndives to Shiri and partially because I was honestly interested, the courses I took through Macedon’s link to Austro University were centered around galactic law and history, with a minor in music theory. For this the captain allowed my commsig to be masked (his comm officer set it up), so it appeared as if I were still on station. It was easy enough to use that excuse to slip a few other comms into the mix, but tailored to Mars. So school was good for something, though I didn’t tell Sid that.
Evan called it fortuitous timing.
Musey called it just a matter of time—before I was caught. And then, he said, he’d be happy to eulogize me.
Oh, but he was good at the burndives and his code tactics were smooth and easy to remember. He said Niko’s brother had taught him, and for a second I thought he’d talk a bit more about it, like he seemed halfway willing to do if I asked him about Captain S’tlian, but of the brother he said nothing except that the man was dead.
Musey knew, of course, what I was doing in the dives. He even asked me how it was going with the girl, marked improvement on his general outlook on relationships, according to Evan. I didn’t aim that high; I thought he just wanted to know if I was being careful.
In my first lesson he’d said, “If you foul up and get caught, I’ll make you regret it.”
My first comm to Shiri reminded me why sometimes we got into shouting matches, and why I loved being with her and missed her these past few months. She was no sycophant. She didn’t let me get a word in at first. I lay back on my bed, hands behind my head, and looked at her in leisure through my mobile as she sped on about how wonderful Paulita Valencia was, how generous and confident and smart. She was learning so much, she said, at Valencia’s news studio on Mars—and wasn’t I impressed that she’d actually made it off Earth? Oh, yeah, and she was so happy to finally be talking to me in real time.
Then she paused, took a breath, and took me in with an easy, appreciative look.
“I missed you,” she said.
The girl could lay it on, but she was sincere, and if I didn’t say something back she was going to reach through the comm and strangle me.
“I missed you too,” I said, “when I’ve had time to think.”
“You’re such a romantic,” she said.
“Well, since you’re not here to have sex with me, what do you expect?”
“Ryan!”
I always loved to tease her with insults. She said it was my sandbox mentality.
“So what’s it like now on station?” she asked. “Now that your father’s said all that and Damiani rules the roost?”
She had some odd idioms. By all that she meant about his past with Falcone, which the meedees after the press conference had actually not pursued to his face (it didn’t last, but at least by then he wasn’t in front of cams and he could ignore the comms). She also meant about the negotiations, which they had asked about. Extensively.
Shiri still didn’t know I was on Macedon, nobody off-ship knew but who had to know, and I couldn’t tell her.
“How do I know you won’t take what I say to the wonderful Ms. Valencia?” I was only half teasing.
She looked back at me, serious. “I’d never do that without your permission, Ryan. Nothing about you has come out from her, right? She respects your father.”
“Not enough to ignore Pompeo. Or ban him from her network.”
“Well… you have to admit, it’s interesting. She limits his hyperbole, anyway.”
“Interesting wouldn’t be my word. It’s my father’s life that SOB is messing with.”
She was silent for a second. “A man in his position does have to be accountable, though.”
“For the work that he does, not his personal life. And he can’t be accountable for what was done to him.”
She never worried much about pissing me off. She knew I liked to engage and she had an uncanny ability to judge how far to take it. “Well,” she said, “what did he do while he was with Falcone?”
“You’re saying he’s a pirate.”
“No, Ryan, he said he was a pirate.”
“I don’t think you were listening to the same transcast. He was
kidnapped by pirates. Why does that make him one?”
“He spent six years with them. As a prisoner? If so, then why didn’t he just say so?”
“Because maybe it’s not so black and white like meedees want to make it.”
She frowned a bit at my disdain. “My point exactly. Therefore he’s accountable to the public and his government to justify his actions.”
“You wouldn’t say that if you knew him. He’s only mean to fools, especially the dangerous ones.”
“Do you know him? You used to always complain about him.”
“I didn’t complain.”
“You bitched, Ryan. About him or your mother or Sid.”
Well, I had. “Before or after Hong Kong? I bitched about everything after Hong Kong.” I could tell her that, I could say it. I saw in her eyes that she wanted to ask more.
“Have you been talking to him regularly?” she said instead. Maybe scared I’d bug and run if she pursued that line of questioning, like I had on Earth.
It was easy to lie, and I didn’t like that. Not to her. “Yeah, we talk. He comms all the time. And he’s not a pirate.”
“The entire galaxy can’t know him like you do.”
“So they should reserve judgment. Actions speak louder, anyway, and they didn’t complain about it when he was winning the war for them.”
“Some people still did. The word that came in about what was going on out there…”
“Dirtsiders have no clue about deep space, Shiri. Nobody farther than the Spokes dislikes my father.”
Broad generalization, but essentially true.
She hated being called a dirtsider. She had nothing to say to that, but I read the flash of anger on her face. She didn’t like my stationer attitude, even when I was right. Or especially when I was right.
“So how is it at Austro now?” she said. “By the way, it’s nice to see you’re still a jerk sometimes.”
I laughed, even though she meant it, and ignored it after that. “It’s mad. You can imagine. Damiani’s a wrench, I swear that woman and her Centralist fanatics…”
Burndive Page 32